Thursday, 17 November 2011

November 16, 2011

Elder Clark and I had to go with the lawyer, Stella, to get clearance for TB, part of the requirements to get our residency permit to stay here until 2013. We have been tested in the past and the results have always been very positive - 30 cm swelling which was hard/tight and painful for about two weeks - so we didn't want to do that again. We have on our medical report notation from our doctor to that effect so we were hoping that we could find the doctor that Stella had dealt with before because she felt that we might be able to avoid that test if we could talk to her. First we had to get an X-ray.

Here's Elder Clark's version of it - "We met Stella at Morousi station and traveled by bus to the hospital site, got our X-Rays and went to the next place to wait for the Doctor. 1 hour and a particularly officious (miserable) supervisor, later Stella said lets go over to the Hospital - where the exact doctor that we were looking for walked out of one door and headed to her consultation room with half a dozen other doctors. She told us to get our X-Rays and meet her later. 1 hour later she emerged from her meeting and directed us back to the area where Mrs. Nasty was, but we just waited and soon the doctor turned up and took us right in to her office. She worked for at least half an hour on our applications and based on what she and the radiologist saw, we were given clearance and were issued certificates on the spot. We didn’t have to take the tests and don’t have to go back on Friday. Yes we felt the special help for sure – Stella kept saying “Oh you are so lucky” at each stopping place"!!!

Now, here's my take on it - When I went in to the room to have the X-ray done, I was looking for a little dressing cubicle! No such thing! Just had to strip there in front of the technician and when I was done, and trying to dress, the next person was ushered in for her X-ray!!! I was thinking – oh well, that person doesn’t know who I am and I’ll likely never see her again. Not the most comforting situation for me. Yes, Stella was so sweet and yes, she did keep repeating how lucky we were – she just couldn’t believe it. I tried to tell her that I felt we were REALLY blessed – but I don’t think she “got it.” So now the pressure is off for them. All being well from now on, they’ll not have to worry about meeting the deadline for submitting the papers for our residency.

Because of the Zone Conference tomorrow, missionaries and a sr. couple came down from Thessaloniki so we had three more sisters and Elder and Sister Collier (from England) staying upstairs with us. The elders that came stayed downstairs and we didn't see much of them as they are pretty self-sufficient down there - but, Brent and I were "on deck" for the cooking! It was fun though - they are such nice people and visiting was a hoot.